The role of sister city in creating sustainable income of municipalities using ism approach

One of the most important factors in urban sustainability is to achieve a sustainable model for financial resources to supply the current construction costs of a city, which makes it possible to invest in the system of infrastructures for urban development.A highly significant task in recent decades is to make interactional contracts directly effective on economic issues. A sister city agreement may positively influence the services provided by the local government or reinforce its financial position and affect the development of the local government sector (Buis, 2009: 190-194). However, the costs of such an agreement may be higher than its advantages, according to the literature (De Villiers, 2009: 149-156). Another problem concerns how to develop a sister-city cooperation (Indriyati et al., 2016: 156-164). The current study aimed at rating the factors effective on international sister-city-based contracts using the sustainable income approach adopted by the municipalities. Theoretical FrameworkAlthough scientific research on sister cities is quite new, inter-city international cooperation is not a new phenomenon, and cooperation in urban settlements has existed for more than 200 years.The purpose of urban sister-city partnership is to unite people to enhance mutual understanding and to increase mutual benefit by sharing new knowledge and opportunities (Shaw & Karlis, 2002: 44 - 44), which has turned into a powerful tool for generation of capacity, learning, and economic and social development in developing countries. The term sister city was introduced by Dwight Eisehower in the 12th century. It aims to establish relations and peace among community members all over the world (Tambunan, 2017: 171 - 171).The sister-city project began in 1951, and was developed in the United States in 1956 (Sitinjak et al., 2014). Traditionally, all local governments around the world have assumed the role of establishing political and cultural relations (Chung & Mascitelli, 2008).

In order to rate the factors effective on the process of making international sister-city-based contracts with a focus on the sustainable incomes of the municipalities, the Interpretational-Structural Modeling (ISM) method was used.

Based on the results obtained by the research model, the most fundamental (fourth-level) constituent elements of international sister-city-based contracts that led to sustainable municipal revenues included the three components of change in management style,  stability of domestic and foreign policies, and law. The five components of staff training, stakeholder accountability, consideration of the market, support packages, and investment opportunities occurred at the third level. The two components of people’s participation and social exchanges occurred at the second level. Finally, the five components of foreign investment attraction, private-sector investment attraction, international entrepreneurship development, tourism growth, and operations were the most superficial (first-level) constituent elements.

According to the results, the three parameters of change in management style, stability of domestic and foreign policies, and law are the most infrastructural (level four) elements in international sister-city-based contracts leading to sustainable incomes for the municipalities. The most super-structural elements include the five parameters of foreign investment attraction, private sector investment attraction, international entrepreneurship development, tourism growth, and operation. In experts’ opinion, the first step that needs to be taken for making international sister-city-based contracts functioning favorably and leading to sustainable incomes for the municipalities is to provide political stability, legal reforms, and managerial methods. The reciprocal relationship between the stability of internal and domestic policies and the legal parameter demonstrated that the internal and domestic policy stability might lead to the realization of legal goals, as with bilateral agreements between countries. Conversely, the expansion of friendly relationships and commercial exchanges provided the requirements for promotion of domestic political efficiency and increase in political power at the international level.Improvement of the above three parameters or the two parameters of change in management style and law made it possible to improve the parameter of staff training. This is particularly important in regard to the change in management style, since improvement of the organizational entrepreneurial culture in municipalities heavily depended on the method of passive and entrepreneurial management in these organizations. Moreover, improvement of the legal conditions and increase in exchanges with other cities would enable official and nonofficial education of the municipality staff. The improvement of the staff training parameter made it possible to improve responsibility to beneficiaries and pay greater attention to the market (domestic and foreign) and to increase support for entrepreneurs and money-making plans. All these factors could be effective in provision of  commercial opportunities. On the other hand, enabling commercial opportunities could improve encouragement and support, enhance the concern for new, innovative aspects of the market, increase responsibility to beneficiaries, and, consequently, raise the possibility of awareness and staff training.Improvement of responsibility to beneficiaries at level two, which is dependent on the appropriate performance of other parameters from level three and level four, could enable people’s participation and cooperation with municipalities, which is now important in achievement of goals concerning urban and regional development; thus, development is impossible without people’s cooperation. Improvement of people’s participation could increase social exchange with municipalities at the domestic and foreign levels. Conversely, increase in social exchange could enable people’s greater participation. Increase in social exchange at level one could also make it possible to achieve goals and operational plans, representing an example of participatory development. Operationalization of the employment and money-making plans of municipalities could enable the growth of tourism activities and improve entrepreneurship spaces at the domestic and foreign levels, leading to the attraction of foreign and private-sector investments, which could in turn contribute to the development of international entrepreneurship, of which urban tourism growth is an important, money-making aspect, helping municipalities achieve project goals and operational plans.